2016 Already?

Chris Christie hasn’t even been elected to a second-term as governor of New Jersey and the media can’t stop talking about the possibility of his candidacy for president in 2016.

In September and October, three main topics about Chris Christie as a politician have emerged from the media. Both Politico and the New York Times have referenced his role in the recovery of Hurricane Sandy, his ability to work with both Republicans and Democrats, and his vocal opinions about the recent shutdown. Analyzing ten news stories, five from the New York Times and five from Politico, multiple trends have become apparent. In five stories from Politico, Christie’s potential 2016 presidential bid was mentioned eight times, whereas in five New York Times stories, the 2016 race was mentioned twice. The New York Times stories have raised questions on Christie’s stance on gay marriage, his effectiveness in the  Hurricane Sandy recovery, and his actual fiscal record as governor of New Jersey. It is interesting to note that three of the New York Times pieces landed on the front page. Scrutiny of his record as governor of New Jersey may be valid if we consider his current campaign for re-election. In the possibility of a presidential candidacy, Christie’s position as a Northeastern Republican needs additional appeal to the Republican conservative base. As he emphasizes continued “fiscal sanity” in New Jersey, the New York Times questions how accurate Christie’s declarations are. This scrutiny seems to exist in coverage as he is running for re-election, however, as it is the national edition of the New York Times, to what extent may this recent front page scrutiny be considered agenda-setting?

Politico has focused on political relationships and Christie’s vocal opinions on issues such as the government shutdown and Hurricane Sandy. In a recent story recounting the one-year anniversary of the devastating storm, Politico recounted Christie’s interaction with President Obama. Christie is quoted referring to his interaction with President Obama after the storm, “He and I spoke every day for at least the next 10 days – every day – sometimes more than once a day and it was substantive conversations.” Politico has used examples such as this to frame Christie as an individual less concerned with party politics allowing him to gain increased bipartisan support. Each of these five Politico articles have framed Christie as a politician focused on tackling problems and his ability to work with both Republicans and Democrats. Two articles have highlighted polls, which indicate his support among African-American voters, and a recent endorsement by Shaquille O’Neal in the New Jersey gubernatorial race which have contributed to Christie’s commanding lead against state senator Barbara Buono.

It is clear that the Politico stories have used positive tone to their coverage of Chris Christie, while The New York Times has used a more negative tone. If agenda setting exists in this form of coverage of Chris Christie, is it responsible for the media to report in this way? How will coverage like this influence public opinion on Chris Christie in the upcoming gubernatorial election? In Christie’s possible presidential candidacy? Effect on politicians in general?

You’re a Student, so READ ME. Personalization Bias in Media Coverage: Education

How does the media cover federal funding for higher education (specifically for minorities: low-income, first-generation students of diverse backgrounds)?

As mentioned in my previous blog post, there seems to be disconnection between national and local news sources when it comes to media coverage on federal funding for higher education. (Add: What is this disconnection?)

Comparing New York Times to general local news sources, I was surprised by how little the New York Times reported on federal funding for higher education as compared to local news sources. Out of 13 articles I found, only 4 New York Times articles have discussed this issue, while other local news sources take up the remaining 9.

Why is it so surprising?!

Well, the fact is that education programs such as TRIO are established and funded by the national government itself. Why then do national news companies not cover on such issues as heavily as local news companies if programs such as TRIO were established by the national government itself?

Let’s take this discussion a little further.

One trend that emerged from my observation when comparing New York Times news coverage to general local news coverage is personalization. As mentioned in one of the class readings, Bennett defines personalization with an analogy, “can’t see the forest for the trees.” In other words, it is hard to see the bigger picture and focus on the main issue because of the actor(s) who are crowding center stage and are caught in the eye of the news camera.

Personalization in my analysis asks the question: Does the article mention Obama and/or his administration? The table below answers this question. Sources are in order of dates.

Source	Personalization	Tone (Pos, Neg, Neu)
New York Times	Yes	Positive
Think Progress	No	Negative
New York Times	No	Positive
New York Times	Yes	Neutral
Inside Higher Ed	No	Positive
The Pueblo Chieftain	No	Negative
Minnesota Daily	No	Neutral
Wyoming Tribune Eagle	No	Positive
Eagle Tribune	No	Negative
GazetteXtra	No	Neutral
USA Today	No	Neutral
New York Times	Yes	Positive
Magnolia Reporter	No	Positive

As we can see in this table, the New York Times only covers this issue 4 times. This number is relatively small compared to the other sources and it shows the level of importance this issue stands at a national level—which of course is not very high.

Personalization took place 3 times out of the 13 articles I have analyzed, BUT notice how it only appears in the national news coverage and not local. It seems that topic of federal funding for higher education deems important to the New York Times only when Obama or his administration mentions this issue to the public.

Taking this one step further, NOTICE how the 3 articles with personalization disseminate a more positive tone, while the rest of the 13 articles are a mixture of positive, negative, and neutral tones. My point here is… the news coverages that New York Times make are not accurate reflections of this issue. It distributes and publicizes this positive emotional effect, leaving a sense of hope for positive change in the lives of students, teachers, and academic institutions, but it’s rather the mixture of both positive and negative.

This then brings up the question: Should we trust national news reports at all? If so, to what extent should we trust them?

The Road To the Road To the Road To the White House

 

The media, with the attention span of a concussed goldfish

That was how Jon Stewart described the premature media speculation of the still far off 2016 election on The Daily Show back in March of 2013 following Obama’s reelection. While he primarily directs his critiques towards broadcast media news outlets such as CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC, print media sources have been just as guilty of this ostensibly short attention span when it comes to potential 2016 presidential candidates.

In order to understand this early coverage in a more meaningful way (rather than brushing it off as a ‘squirrel!’ chased by the media), it is helpful to code for certain variables that often come up in the media speculation. This coding process includes identifying a news article that is focused specifically on (in this case) Hillary Clinton’s potential 2016 campaign, and then counting the number of times a specific topic or person is mentioned. Over the course of the last few months, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal have effectively framed three narratives regarding Clinton’s still pending campaign announcement: references to Clinton’s personal life and/or attributes (including her family, age, and gender), commentary on her political career, and a general discussion of the campaign political strategies that will likely be adopted by Hillary’s advisers and the two major political parties in the case that she does announce her candidacy.

Laying the groundwork

However, each newspaper focuses on these narratives to a different extent in their 2016 coverage. For example, in seven substantial New York Times articles focused specifically on Clinton’s potential campaign, journalists were nearly twice as likely to discuss potential campaign strategies rather than Hillary’s political career or specific policy measures. There were also comparatively high discussion about Clinton’s personal life in many of the NYT articles, as is evident in Jonathan Martin’s article entitled Republicans Paint Clinton as Old News for 2016 Election. This particular article effectively exhibits the power of the media in framing coverage of a candidate in two areas: one, the larger party platform and strategy measures and two, the role of the candidate’s personal life in presidential elections. These two discussions are undeniably interconnected, as is exemplified by the quote (again, from Martin’s article): “A Republican approach that calls attention to Mrs. Clinton’s age is not without peril, and Democrats predict that it could backfire.”

What about policy?

In my eyes, while the personal life of a candidate inevitably comes under scrutiny, and though campaign strategy and fundraising have been hot topics in the past few elections, in the end one would hope that the public would want to elect a candidate based on their political credentials and experience that will help them best serve the nation as president. That being said, the political career of a candidate does not always make for the juiciest news story (unless it is scandal ridden). Nevertheless, in examining content over the last few months, The Wall Street Journal dedicated nearly 40% of its coverage of Clinton to her political career, and how that would play out in a potential presidential campaign (compared to NYT’s 20%). For example, Peter Nicholas’ article Clinton Draws Notice for Her Policy Stands, he does an excellent job of outlining the interplay between both Hillary’s policy stands and her potential campaign strategy, with hardly any reference to her personal life at all.

Out of the three framing narratives discussed, Clinton’s campaign strategy received equal attention from both newspapers (at about 40% of the coverage in each). This covers potential fundraising efforts, voter outreach strategies, and teams of advisers waiting in the wings to improve on their 2008 performance. Out of the three frames, which do you think have the most impact on public opinion? Which is easiest to communicate to a reader?

On a separate note – in the same Daily Show bit, Stewart makes a stab at the premature candidate polls by predicting Hillary as the Democratic nominee “with zero states reporting or caring.” Is the media really just a concussed goldfish in this situation? Does the public really even care about Hillary’s still potential campaign, or is this just another agenda setting technique of the media to tell us that we should care?

Tone and Personalization: Factors in Immigration Reform Coverage?

Media coverage in the US is commonly thought of as biased and poorly done. Many distrust the media, but is this distrust founded? In order to examine this it is helpful to look at two sources, one of which would seem to have bias, and compare their coverage on a topic. Looking at one topic, immigration reform, and two sources, The New York Times and Univision (supposed bias towards passing immigration reform bill), allows one to see how coverage differs if bias is present. It is necessary to narrow down what is being compared to do so I will only look at the articles’ tone and use of personalization (which in basic terms is how frequently the article focuses on human aspects of the issue). Finally for additional restriction I only collected sources for the month of September in 2013.

First off, it is important to note why these sources are important for the topic of interest in this example, immigration reform. Both The New York Times and Univision are national news sources in the United States. This is crucial because the sources match the level of analysis, the national level. Additionally these two sources hit two relevant subsets of the population of study, English speakers and Spanish Speakers within the nation. It would be assumed that Univision would have a bias toward passing the immigration bill to please its largely Hispanic and immigrant reading base.

To look for tone in the articles of study I coded each article for the general perspective the article gave on the issue and also how it portrayed Congress’ role in the new immigration reform bill. Looking for references to congress I specifically searched for three things. The number of times the word “congress” is mentioned. The word congreso is used in Spanish searches. The number of time The House of Representatives is mentioned, for Spanish searches I looked for “La Casa de Representaciones.” Finally, I looked for the amount of times the words kill, prevent, and stop are used in relation to Congress’ actions. Searches in Spanish use the words mata, impieda, and previene are used. These words were the indicators of harsh language used to describe Congress.

First looking just at overall tone of the article there are surprising results. While one might expect Univision to have a large number of articles with a negative tone towards Congress, they are relatively close to The New York Times tone. Both sources only present two tones, neutral (neu) or negative (neg). Univision has a total of three articles with a negative tone and two with a neutral tone. The New York Times has an article with negative tone and an article with neutral tone.

Next when looking at the mentions of Congress one sees a range depending on the article. The average number of mentions for the two sources combined is three per article. This mean is low when compared to the maximums in each source. The New York Times has an article with seven mentions of Congress and Univision is not far behind with maximum mentions of Congress at six.

The other two methods of coding did not produce large numbers, which in and of itself is significant. There was an average of 0.6 uses of harsh language used in both sources in addition to an average of 2 mentions of The House of Representatives when the sources’ measures are combined. Noting this it is clear that while there is a slightly negative tone overall about the process of passing the bill and Congress’ role in this process, harsh language is not common and neither is focusing on a specific part of Congress in relation to the issues of immigration.

Now looking at personalization. This category is analyzed by looking at the amount of times the consequences of the bill are mentioned, the number of times immigrant and race, specifically “white” and Hispanic/Latino,” are mentioned, and also by studying the images presented with the article. When searching for immigrant in Spanish articles the word inmigrante is used. Similarly when examining mentions of race in Spanish the words “Blanco/a” was used, furthermore when looking for Hispanic “Hispano/a” and “Latino/a” are used. Pictures are categorized into either population (pop) or politician (pol) photos.

The average time the consequences of the bill are mentioned for the two sources is eight per article. The New York Times’ maximum mentions per article is ten while Univision’s is fifteen. When looking at the sources individually, one might expect Univision to have a higher average mentions of the effects of the population per article, but that is not the case. The New York Times averages eight point five mentions per article while Univision averages seven point five mentions.

Looking next at mentions of race and immigrant we can see that immigrant is mentioned most and white mentioned least. It is clear that The New York Times has the most mentions of immigrant when looking at the graph with both articles around ten. This is different than Univision which averages one point four mentions per article.

Finally when looking at the images, there is a clear trend toward pictures of the population with and five of the seven articles showing images of members of the populace.

While one might expect Univision to have a bias toward pro immigration policy, this analysis says otherwise. Both The New York Times and Univision present similar coverage of the topic of immigration reform.  

Does the UK care more about the environment?

Climate change. It’s a hot issue (like our planet’s going to be because of global warming!) with potentially very big consequences. Yet, one accompanying question often asked is how big a deal is climate change, really? How does what we hear from the media line up with what science tells us? And here in the United States, are we getting a different picture than other countries are? I followed coverage of international environmental policy in both The New York Times and The Guardian, specifically performing quantitative analysis for dramatization. I did this by counting the number of dramatic words—here meaning words which evoke a strong emotion; for example, “calamity” or “danger”—in both the headline and the article itself.

Dramatic Words In The Sources

Interestingly, only two of the six articles gathered from The New York Times included dramatic words in their headlines. However, all six articles had at least one dramatic word within their actual text. So while only 33% of the articles appeared dramatic on first glance, 100% of them evoked this emotion in the articles themselves. Of course, the average reader skimming the paper only sees the headline, which means that Average Joe walks away feeling perfectly calm about environmental policy.

This article on the future financial costs of climate change rose to the top of dramatization in The New York Times in both headlines and article itself. The headline included one dramatic phrase, “the cost of fixing the future”, while the article contained a whopping ten dramatic words, far outstripping the average for my articles from The New York Times, which was 4.5 emotion-evoking words.

In The Guardian, however, three out of the four articles had at least one dramatic word in their headline, and all four had at least one in their article itself. So 75% of the headlines were dramatized, and 100% of the articles were. Unlike the articles from The New York Times, the number of dramatic words in the articles was fairly consistent throughout all four—five or six dramatic words in three articles, with this article detailing the effects of the recent U.S. government shutdown on environmental policy in Antarctica coming in at a dry one word.

The Guardian and The New York Times Compared

Source		Avg #Dramatic Words (Headline)		Avg #Dramatic Words in Article	Avg % Dramatic Words
The Guardian		1		4.25	0.63%
The NYT		0.33333		4.5	0.43%

This chart shows us that over the sample size studied, The Guardian’s articles tend to be more dramatic, both in the headlines and in the percentage of dramatic words (relative to total number of words). What do these statistics tell us about media coverage in the United Kingdom compared to the United States? Well, they imply that The Guardian views environmental policy as a bigger deal than The New York Times does. The Guardian includes articles detailing the “inevitable” repercussions of “blowing the carbon budget” as a call to action for their readers and their government. The New York Times publishes articles informing their readers of the debate over which country gets to use more carbon. The lack of drama in this American news source eliminates the sense of urgency and importance found in The Guardian and replaces it with a sense of “Look what our government’s doing about the environment! Yay!”

Will It Continue?

As the semester progresses, it will be interesting to see if these initial patterns established continue. What do you think—are my findings true to your experience with American media’s portrayal of environmental issues?  Or do you disagree and think I’m reading too much into these words?

A Man Outside the Madness: Chris Christie

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie is widely known as a potential candidate for the 2016 U.S. Presidential election. His up-front leadership style, bi-partisan approach, and get-it done spirit have brought him national recognition in recent years and launched him to the forefront of political prominence. Frequent appearances on cable TV and late night talk shows have contributed to a jump in popularity. His undeniably authentic personality and charisma shine during these appearances. Media image will continue to be critical in molding political beliefs and attitudes of voters towards potential candidates like Christie in anticipation of the 2016 election. That said, how does the media frame Chris Christie as a politician? Examination of Politico and the New York Time’s coverage of Christie illustrates his contrast from the political brinksmanship in Washington as popular figure with potential to draw people together.

In September and October news stories, Politico has covered Chris Christie as a Washington outsider with strong opinions about the government shutdown. In anticipation of the New Jersey gubernatorial election on November 5^th, Governor Christie leads his opponent, Democrat state Senator Barbara Buono by over 20 points according to the most recent Quinnipiac and Rasmussen polls. It is also important to note that 58 New Jersey Democratic elected officials have endorsed Christie. His prominence as a popular governor has caused Politico to highlight him as a strong leader and popular persona with bi-partisan contrast to the mess in Washington. It can be argued that Politico has covered Christie with a more positive or neutral tone in recent months in comparison to the New York Times.

These stories effectively garner attention about Christie as politician and public figure with national prominence, yet they pay much less attention to any specific legislative outcomes or achievements in his term as the governor of New Jersey. As a recent news story from Politico indicates, his rise in national exposure could be attributed to his proximity to cable TV studios in Midtown Manhattan. In contrast, recent stories in The New York Times about Christie have focused on divisive political issues such as big money donors and gay marriage suggesting a more negative tone to New York Times coverage of the governor on contentious issues. A story on Christie’s involvement with The Republican Governors Association landed on the front page of the New York Times on September 17th. With the headline “Donors’ Funds Sidestep Law, Aiding Christie,” this article suggests that Christie has skirted around campaign finance laws, and although the article briefly touches on how his opponent has also “been lavishly backed by outside groups and unions,” the article clearly focuses on Christie as the defiant politician. According to an analysis, the Times suggest that these outside groups are crucial to Christie’s reelection and 2016 prospects. While this may be true, the Times fails to provide details on their “analysis” and therefore fails to provide a convincing argument, thus providing a divisive compilation of quotes and numbers.

It is clear that coverage of politics and public figures have enormous influence on public opinion. As Murray Edelman suggests in his paper titled Contestable Categories and Public Opinion, the media possess “remarkable power” in categorization and classification of political issues that are central to the benefit of certain groups. In relation to coverage of Chris Christie, it is no surprise that more positive coverage by sources like Politico benefit his popularity. On the other hand, articles in the New York Times highlight more divisive issues and create reluctance from readers towards the governor as a potential presidential candidate.

Through examination of coverage of Christie by Politico and the New York Times, it is clear that he has been characterized for his contrast from the political brinksmanship in Washington as popular figure with potential to draw people together. While the media clearly emphasizes Christie as an outsider to the political turmoil in Washington DC, this coverage raises additional questions. What role can the media play in producing a more educated electorate, rather than producing a popularity contest? How can we as citizens understand what is important:  image or record?